I had a great conversation this past week with good friend of mine, who is in an influential and important role in Grand Rapids. She was looking to amplify her brand, meaning raise her profile in the community. Although she is very involved in the community, which is a huge part of her job, not a lot of people realize her level of engagement or the breadth of that involvement. Why? Because if it didn’t happen on social media, then did it really happen at all?

I know this sounds utterly ridiculous and in some ways it absolutely is, however we now live in the digital age which affords us a lot of opportunities but also takes away anonymity. Unfortunately, you can’t have it both ways.

My advice to my friend on increasing her visibility within the community, was the following.

When you attend events, go to meetings or are giving a presentation; be sure to check-in on social media with an explanation of what you are doing. This broadcasts your involvement to the community and also allows those attending the same event to find you and network.

Share photos of your adventures. If you are walking in downtown Grand Rapids, grabbing coffee, attending an event, grab a photo and share with your followers. This showcases you are out and about and involved. I realize this may seem silly, but how often do you check social media in a day? 12 times? 15 times? Too many to count?

Post articles or blogs you have written or feel will educate on a certain issue that is important to you or relevant to your job. This will help position you as knowledgeable, informed and thoughtful.

Take advantage of either Facebook or Instagram Stories. Have fun with it! Show a more personal side, take pictures with your dogs, put on those damn bunny or dog ears/nose, make a video, get your emoji game on…the possibilities are endless.

For this blog, I focused on social media as a tool to increase your visibility, there are so many ways to do so, but all roads lead back to social media when it comes down to communicating what you are up to.

Looking for more resources or articles on personal brand, check out the below blogs.

Where the hell do you even start? Whether you are the one responsible for creating a marketing plan or you are working with an agency, you need to understand the components.

The following outline is what I start with when crafting a strategy and then I customize based on the client, industry and overall goals. This will give you a starting point, and you can then add and subtract from there.

Marketing Plan Overview:This is just a paragraph or two of what is included in the plan. What are the components and sections that are outlined in the strategy.

Goals & Objectives: It is imperative that you map out measurable goals, break it out into internal and external goals. Below are some examples:

Increase leads through website by 10 a month.

Map out internal processes to streamline the customer service experience.

You will also want to outline how you plan to measure each of these goals. Obviously with the website lead generation, it will be how many forms are filled out, calls made, traffic on page, etc. For the internal processes, you can set a timeline of when each section will be completed.

SWOT Analysis:SWOT Analysis is a tool for examining the current status of a company in a particular marketplace. This is not expected to be timeliness, but to give a snapshot of the company and the market forces at this point in time.

Strengths & Weaknesses: Internal factors that can support or hinder a company’s success. These are factors that the company has control over, and can change over time. Examples: reputation, education, location, patents, assets, competitive advantages

Opportunities & Threats: External market forces that can support or hinder a company’s success in the marketplace. These factors are outside of the company’s control.

Competitor Analysis: This may seem redundant year after year, but it is important to revisit ever year. Look at what your major competitors are doing well or not so well in the marketing realm, so look at their website, social media, search rank, blogging, email marketing and more. Learn from what they are doing well and avoid what they are not doing well.

Research:This section will vary based on your industry. However, if you have done surveys or client interviews in the past, that is a great starting point. You can also indicate in the strategy that surveys are going to be implemented as part of the strategy. By gathering as much intel as you can on your current and past customers, you can effectively plan out tools and tactics within the plan. This section is also where you map out buyer/audience personals. Below is an example, if the client was a home builder or realty company:

Millennial Couple with Young Kinds, a Dog

Clear pricing is important for this group so they can manage budget, although they are often willing to stretch.

Space is important for kids to be close and have places to play, desire to entertain family and friends is also important.

They research every buying decision online before moving forward. This is often done on a tablet or mobile phone.

They are avid watchers of HGTV, especially Fixer Upper as they can relate to Chip and Joanna Gaines.

Messaging: Clear and consistent messaging is a must for all brands. By maintaining consistence across all communication mediums, you ensure that everyone is receiving the right message. In this section outline your brand attributes, positioning statement, elevator speech, tagline, tone and voice and sample language.

Tactics: This is the section where you map out how you are going to achieve the goals you mapped out early on in the strategy. Depending on what the research, competitor analysis and other sections reveal this can include, but is not limited to:

Community engagement

Digital – SEO/SEM

Email marketing

Social media

Video

Advertising

Public relations

Blogging

The next section is implementation. I recommend breaking this out first quarterly, then monthly, then weekly and finally daily. Be sure everyone on your team knows what they are responsible for and revisit the strategy often in bi-weekly meetings to adjust as needed.

I have long been a fan of Southwest Airlines. Besides the fact that their boarding process is genius, prices are on point and the staff always seems pretty damn nice – the marketing is also humorous, strategic and well implemented.

Here are the top reasons I am crushing on Southwest Airlines:

They listen. Every time I have tweeted them they have tweeted back, not automated responses but an actual person responding to my question or rant.

The content is timely. They actually answer customer questions and use video, photos and more to tell the story. For example, we have all stared out the window when a plane was being de-iced and wonder what the hell is being sprayed or who is in the bucket. By utilizing video they informed passengers on the process. They also made another one on the temperature in the cabin, because we are all wondering why the hell it gets so hot right before take-off.

They have crisis plan and they are creative about it. Just last year they experienced a massive technology outage, which resulted in cancelled flights, scheduling issues and the website being down. The organization employed Facebook Live for the first time ever to address the situation, and watched as its audience interacted with the content in a much more favorable way than if it had merely issued a statement. Read more about it here.

They deploy multiple tools. Whether it is multiple social channels, video, online advertising, storytelling and catchy campaigns (Wanna get away) – and they know how to tie everything together. For such a big company, that is impressive.

What truly makes them unique, is the fact that they genuinely care about their customers. From their processes to the communication tools they use, they are innovative and their culture reflects that. Culture is the most important strategy a company can invest in.

Designing is not a skill I possess. I do, however, understand the importance of integrating visual content into every aspect of your communication tools. A recent article by HubSpot states:

When people hear information, they’re likely to remember only 10% of that information three days later. However, if a relevant image is paired with that same information, people retained 65% of the information three days later.

So what does that mean to us as marketers or business owners? Write less, show more. At 834, we harp on you to create quality content consistently on a weekly and daily basis. That doesn’t mean it has to be all written, tell your story in other ways. Here are a few suggestions:

Infographics. Have a lot of statistics or a complex process you are trying to communicate? Infographics are the way to go. MassPlanner writes: Infographics are liked and shared on social media 3X more than other any other type of content. Can you really argue with that stat?

Video. I am not talking 50k video projects, just your smartphone, a stand, a remote and the addition of your logo at the beginning and contact information at the end. Did you know that according to Syndacast, using the word “video” in an email subject line boosts open rates by 19%, click-through rates by 65% and reduces unsubscribes by 26%.

Images. We incorporate header images into every single blog we create for our clients. The image represents what the blog encompasses as well as catching the attention of a potential reader. The Kissmetrics‘ blog writes, content with relevant images gets 94% more views than content without relevant images.

Need more proof? Just look at the fastest growing social media networks – Pinterest, Instagram and SnapChat. All of these are built around, what? That’s right…imagery, video and infographics.